Examine the Scriptures ("the App") is a Bible study application developed by Still Standing Studios, LLC. We built it to be a calm, private place to study Scripture, and we designed it to collect as little as possible. This policy explains, in plain terms, what the App does and does not do with information.
Without an account, your study work stays on your device. You can use the entire App without signing in. When you do, the answers you type, your personal notes, your highlights, and your bookmarks are saved locally on your device only. This information is never transmitted to us, and we cannot see it. The only thing the App sends without an account is anonymous crash and error diagnostics, described under "App Diagnostics and Crash Reports" below; those never include your study work.
If you choose to sign in (optional). Signing in is never required and unlocks nothing except sync. If you create an account, we collect and store:
Sign-in is offered through Google, Apple, or an email address and password, and is handled by Firebase Authentication (a Google service). We never see or store your Google or Apple password, and for email sign-in your password is managed by Firebase, not stored by us in readable form.
No advertising or tracking identifiers. The App does not use the device advertising ID and does not use any cross-app or cross-site tracking technology.
The web version of the App keeps you signed in using browser storage that is strictly necessary for the App to function. We do not set advertising or analytics cookies and do not run third-party trackers, so no cookie-consent banner is required to use the web version.
The App connects to the internet only for these purposes:
Syncing your work (signed-in users only). If you are signed in, your study answers and progress are saved to our cloud service (Google Firebase — Cloud Firestore) under your account, so the same work appears on your other devices. Only your account can read your work; it is protected by per-user security rules. If you are not signed in, nothing is synced.
Downloading studies. Study lessons are delivered from our cloud service (Google Firebase — Cloud Firestore and Cloud Storage). When your device requests a study, the request necessarily includes your device's IP address, which is used only to deliver the content and for ordinary security and reliability logging by our service provider. It is not used to identify you or build a profile.
Licensed modern translations (Teacher Edition subscribers only). If you subscribe to the Teacher Edition, the App can display the NASB 2020, NKJV, and CSB translations, which are provided under license through API.Bible (a service of the American Bible Society). When you open a passage in one of these translations, the App requests it from API.Bible. To satisfy the license terms, the App reports anonymous usage to API.Bible's fair-use management system using a random identifier the App generates (not your name, not your account, and not the device advertising ID) plus a separate per-session identifier. This reporting contains no personal information. The public-domain ASV and WEB translations are built into the App and require no connection.
App diagnostics and crash reports. To find and fix problems, the App uses Firebase Crashlytics (a Google service) to send a report when it crashes or runs into an unexpected error. A report describes what went wrong — the technical error and where it happened in the App's code — together with basic technical context such as your device model, operating-system version, the App version, and a random identifier the diagnostics service generates to group reports from the same installation. These reports are sent whether or not you are signed in. They never contain your answers, notes, highlights, bookmarks, email address, or any study content, and they do not use the device advertising ID or track you across other apps. Reports are transmitted to Google Firebase over encrypted connections.
The App offers an optional Teacher Edition subscription and optional one-time tips. These purchases are processed entirely by the app store (Google Play, and in the future the Apple App Store). We do not receive or store your payment card details. The stores handle billing, receipts, renewals, and cancellations under their own privacy policies. The App records only whether a subscription entitlement is active.
The App does not request access to your camera, microphone, contacts, location, photos, or files. Exporting a completed study as a PDF uses your device's standard print/share screen; the App does not read your stored files.
The App is intended for a general audience of adult Bible students and teachers. It is not directed to children, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children.
Your study work stays on your device unless you sign in. If you do sign in, your account information and synced study work are stored with Google Firebase and transmitted over encrypted (HTTPS) connections, and access is restricted by per-user security rules so that only your account can read your data. Content delivery and the licensed-translation service also use encrypted connections. Firebase's handling of data is described in Google's privacy and security information for Firebase.
If you never sign in, all of your work lives on your device, and you can remove it at any time by clearing the App's data in your device settings or by uninstalling the App.
If you have signed in, you can delete your account and its synced study work at any time from within the App (Settings → Account → Delete account). Deleting your account removes your synced data from our systems. Work that was stored only on your device remains on your device until you clear or uninstall the App.
If we make further changes to how information is handled, we will update this policy and revise the effective date above.
If you have questions about this Privacy Policy, contact us at privacy@stillstandingstudios.com.